Dear Mark and all,
There is an argument lurking in the discussion that is one of the classic
fallacies (of the sort that PhD students should avoid!). Martyn draws
attention to it.
Avoiding fallacies in discussion and analysis is important because it is
one of the core skills of PhD study and PhD supervision.
Lurking in the discussion is fallacious reasoning that follows the
following sequence,
Design practitioners are good at design.
Some design practitioners make good teachers.
PhD supervision sometimes involves some teaching.
Some design PhD students have practice as part of their PhD research.
Therefore the required skills of a PhD supervisor are those of a Design
practitioner"
This combines three fallacies:
1. The fallacy of proof through association ("I saw him in the same city.
Therefore it must have been him that did it")
2. The fallacy of partial proof (A shark can be a parent. Parents supervise
children swimming. Therefore, sharks are good at supervising children
swimming)
3. The fallacy of the excluded middle (A cat has four legs and a dog has
four legs therefore a cat is a dog)
Fundamentally the problem is of avoiding rhetorical reasoning that uses
fallacies.
The solution to use supervisors that help candidates avoid rhetorical
fallacious reasoning in their PhDs.
To identify suitable supervisors requires avoiding the same problems with
rhetorical fallacies and being straightforward: e.g. make a complete list of
the skills, competencies and experiences needed by the PhD supervisor and
ensure that the supervisor has those skills.
The only common training program for most of the necessary skills is a PhD
followed by being mentored for a few years by more experienced persons with
PhDs.
As a side note, one of the weaknesses of Art and Design PhD study
internationally is that for a decade or more we have had PhD candidates
coming though with poor supervision in reasoning skills and avoiding
rhetorical fallacies. This problem exists to the extent that a three or four
years ago one text aimed at PhD students openly advocated Design PhD
students committing research sins such as presenting biased evidence,
giving false or contrived analyses and deceiving the reader - using any
rhetorical trick to persuade the reader to the author's position. At the
same time, the authors themselves (experienced and respected design
educators) used fallacious arguments to persuade PhD students that this was
normal and exemplary research and thesis writing behaviour. The book is
still in print and some supervisors and PhD students are using it. The
consequence will be that the same problems will propagate into the next
generation of Design PhDs. It's important for PhD students to be aware of
this problem in the field.
Best wishes,
Terry
____________________
Dr. Terence Love, FDRS, AMIMechE, PMACM, MISI
Director Design-focused Research Group, Design Out Crime Research Group
Researcher, Digital Ecosystems and Business Intelligence Institute
Associate, Planning and Transport Research Centre
Curtin University, PO Box U1987, Perth, Western Australia 6845
Mob: 0434 975 848, Fax +61(0)8 9305 7629, [log in to unmask]
Visiting Professor, Member of Scientific Council
UNIDCOM/ IADE, Lisbon, Portugal
Honorary Fellow, Institute of Entrepreneurship and Enterprise Development
Management School, Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK
____________________
-----Original Message-----
From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related
research in Design [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Evans,
Martyn
Sent: Wednesday, 11 November 2009 5:29 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: PhD supervision of practice as a research method?
Hi Mark
Your post brings to my mind a dilemma: Do good designers make good
design lecturers (and supervisors)? In my opinion, the two are not
mutually exclusive. With over 12 years experience in practice and
academia, I can recount numerous examples of 'good' designers who do not
make 'good' lecturers, and conversely 'good' design lecturers that
cannot design for toffee!!! That said, they may enable students to
create excellent design work and develop influential design careers (a
long debate about what 'good' means no doubt will ensue...).
You say ...I'd therefore like to offer up the potentially controversial
position that PhD's that include practice as a research method should,
preferably, be supervised by academics that have considerable experience
as practitioners...
The key issue here relates to the validity and nature of the experience
as practitioners. Does considerable experience (length of service?)
imply this experience will result in the ability to effectively
supervise PhD's that include practice as a research?
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